Informant Accused Of Fraud

May 12, 1986|By Maurice Possley.

A New Jersey man with a long history of insurance swindles has been indicted by a federal grand jury in Chicago on charges of orchestrating a multimillion-dollar fraud on the Kenilworth Insurance Co. in Illinois at the same time he was working as an informant for the FBI in Philadelphia.

John Valentine Goepfert, 58, was indicted last week along with four others on multiple counts of mail fraud relating to the alleged looting of Kenilworth Insurance beginning in 1981 until the company was closed by Illinois insurance regulators in April, 1982.

Court records previously obtained by The Tribune showed that Goepfert was working full-time as an FBI informant for the bureau`s Philadelphia office at the time of the Kenilworth fraud.

At the time, a federal source in Washington, who spoke on the condition that he not be named, said Goepfert had been warned that he could face prosecution for his activities at Kenilworth.

State officials in Illinois and the U.S. attorney`s office and FBI in Chicago said they were unaware that Goepfert was helping the Philadelphia FBI while working for Kenilworth at the same time.

Indicted along with Goepfert were Chester Mitchell Jr., 64, of 460 W. Russell St., Barrington, former president of Kenilworth; Joseph R. Cosentino, 54, of 400 E. Randolph St.; Robert Patterson, 48, of 148 157th St., Calumet City; and Willard Hayne, former owner of the Essex Insurance Agency, San Diego.

Goepfert and the three Chicago area men were charged with setting up a shell company through which they diverted $250,000 in insurance premiums to themselves from Kenilworth, formerly located at 303 E. Ohio St.

The indictment, brought by Assistant U.S. Attys. Joseph J. Duffy and Philip A. Turner, charged that the four established an insurance agency called Robco Worldwide Facilities, 222 W. Adams St., and used it as a nominee, funneling Kenilworth premiums through Worldwide into their own pockets.

Although the indictment only charged a fraud of $250,000, insurance regulators have said that as much as $27 million in company premiums disappeared.

Hayne is accused of arranging a secret agreement with Mitchell and Goepfert in which the three split 4 percent of all insurance business Essex placed with Kenilworth.

The indictment also charges Cosentino, a former Chicago bail bondsman and onetime partner of Irwin Weiner, with failing to file federal tax returns for 1981, 1982 and 1983. A congressional committee has described Weiner as having links to organized crime.

In addition, Mitchell is charged with paying $50,000 to Robert Rasmussen, former manager of the Illinois Automobile Insurance Plan, in return for obtaining preferential treatment for Kenilworth. Rasmussen, an unindicted co- conspirator, was convicted earlier of taking kickbacks in exchange for giving favorable treatment to Illiniois insurance companies by placing high risk car drivers in low risk groups.

Goepfert, who once lived on a lavish estate in rural New Jersey, has been involved in a number of financial dealings with insurance companies that ultimately bankrupted the firms.

In 1972, according to court records, he embezzled millions of dollars in premiums from a New Jersey company called Service Fire. He was not charged with any crime. A few years later, a judge found in a civil lawsuit that Goepfert had looted more than $6 million from Argonaut Insurance Co, in New Jersey, but he was not charged with a crime in that case, either.

However, in 1980 he was indicted in Philadelphia on charges of issuing phony construction performance bonds, a form of insurance. In 1981 he was indicted in New York on chages of converting more than $1 million in premiums from the Sasse Syndicate, formerly an underwriting firm for Lloyd`s of London. In March, 1981, he was convicted in Philadelphia, and he then pleaded guilty to the New York charges. He agreed to be an informant for the FBI, beginning in 1982, according to court records.

Details of his cooperation became public in 1983 when a Philadelphia prosecutor, James J. Rohn, asked a federal judge to cut Goepfert`s 10-year term for the Sasse fraud.

Rohn said Goepfert had participated in several investigations, including one that led to the indictment of three members of an international securities fraud ring, an unsuccessful inquiry into an organized-crime narcotics trafficking operation that used a Florida bail-bond business as a cover and another that led to the indictment of a St. Louis insurance agent on mail and wire fraud charges.

The judge cut the 10-year term to 5 years. Court records indicated that Rohn did not mention to the judge that he was aware of Goepfert`s involvement with the Kenilworth firm.